1875. 200 W. Franklin St.
By the mid-1870s the French, or mansard, roof was passé in New York and Boston. But Richmond had not participated in the elaborate building of the decade after the Civil War, and hence this house was considered very up to date and evocative of Second Empire France. The house was a showpiece, especially with its elongated first-floor windows that allowed passersby to peer inside. These tall windows give the building a verticality different from many of the other town houses on this rare intact block of nineteenth-century mansions.